Old Friends

Do you have music you consider an old friend? Pieces you keep coming back to, pieces that, no matter how long you’ve gone without playing them, never fail to feel like coming home?  

I have many. Two of my oldest friends are by Bach: the fourth Brandenburg concerto and the cantata “Actus Tragicus “(BWV 106).  These are pieces recorder players get hired to play over and over again, and as a result, I’ve been playing them for decades.  

Fortunately, they are both gorgeous.

Part of what I enjoy most about visiting my old musical friends is that, when I do, I briefly experience the echo of all their previous incarnations.  All the different venues and seasons and times of life in which I’ve encountered them, all the small triumphs and petty failures of execution, the different tempos and interpretations, the colleagues and friends and strangers who have been my partners in bringing these pieces to life.   

I’m drafting this from south Texas, where I’ve just wrapped up performing BOTH Brandenburg 4 and cantata 106- the first time I’ve done them as a double bill. Spending time with my old friends now, as I’m about to take some time off from performing to have my second child, is particularly poignant, and I find my memories surfacing even more insistently than usual.

I remember the terror of learning and performing Brandenburg 4 for the first time in early high school, and how the piece seemed insurmountable.  I recall one of my first away-from-home gigs out of college, playing cantata 106, and how thrilled I was to be put up in a hotel!  With soap!  And towels!  I flash on renditions of agonizing slowness and breathtaking speed, the sorrow I felt the first time I had to turn down a Brandenburg, the pride of performing alongside one of my students.  

These pieces punctuate my musical life.  I’ve been playing them so long they’ve become comfortable. But I’d play them again a million times over, because every single time I do, they teach me something new.  That’s the beauty of old friends and old friendships- they are never too old to surprise and delight.  

And you are never to old to make a musical acquaintance that will grow into a friend.

How Low Can You Go?

The four lowest notes of the recorder are no joke.

Sure, they seem like a a joke sometimes: a mean-spirited practical joke in which you expend Herculean effort only to be rewarded, even in the best-case scenario, with a wisp of sound.

And of course the worst-case scenario is worse, involving squeaks, squawks, gasps and awkward silences.

But low notes (I’m talking about F, F#, G, G# on an F instrument; C, C#, D, D# on a C instrument) absolutely can be accessed reliably and beautifully, sounding each and every time you attempt them.

It just takes a smart and deliberate learning process.  

Accordingly, here are my four top tips for working toward reliable, lovely low notes:

1)   Accept low notes for what they are.  On most recorders, low notes are never going to be loud or ringing or present. And trying to make them loud is only going to make them crack.  Part of the beauty of the recorder and other historical instruments is that each and every note has a slightly different timbre and volume- unlike modern instruments for which timbre has been flattened throughout the instrument’s range. So enjoy the soft sounds of a recorder’s low notes.  Played properly, they are dark and soothing and beautiful.

2)   Think like a doctor.  If you miss a low note, don’t just jam your fingers down again and again trying to make it come out.  Not only is this a recipe for frustration, but even if you eventually hit the note, you’ve lost the opportunity to diagnose what went wrong with your initial attempt.  A missed note isn’t a tragedy; it’s an opportunity to gather information about what’s working and what’s not. Low notes usually fail for one of two reasons: too much air, or leaking fingers.  So sit with your error for a moment while running through a checklist to determine what, exactly, has gone wrong.

a.    First, lower your breath pressure.  If the note comes out as you blow less, you’ll know that you have to work on your air and/or mouth shape.

b.    If lowering your air does nothing, try picking up your lowest finger (if you’re on an F, say, move to the G).  If your playing clarifies as you do this, you’ll know that your problem was with finger 7, your pinky.

c.    If the G is still a no go, continue to pick up fingers, one at a time, to figure out which finger was leaking.  Fix it, then head back down again, one finger at a time.

3)   Play the note.  This sounds almost too flippant to be helpful, but I’ve consistently found that it is.  In order to play a note well, you need to spend time playing it.  And not just playing it, but deliberately cultivating your awareness of what it feels like, sounds like, and looks like to play your low note in a relaxed way.  So once you’ve found a good low F, hang out there for a while. Relax your fingers, jaw, and tongue, etching the feeling of successful playing into your body and mind so that you can access it more easily next time.

4)   Go home. After you’ve spent sufficient time hanging out on your low note to ingrain how it feels, make it your home.  My favorite exercise for low notes is one I call “home base.”   Play your low note beautifully, long and low and slow.  Then leap up one note and return to home base. Then two notes, then three notes, returning home to your low note every time.  This helps ground your low note as something to be leapt from, not to, while improving your ability to move from high to low.

Enjoy your low notes!  (Quietly.)

Is it Me Or the Instrument?

Photo credit: Jennifer Carpenter

I joke sometimes that if you make a sound on the recorder you don’t like,  you should immediately withdraw the instrument from your lips and hold it front of your face with furrowed brow and narrowed eyes, lips pulled back in a rictus of incredulity, as if to say: Et tu, Recorder?

This is sure to absolve you of any error.

Of course, in  95% of cases, the root of a problem lies not with the instrument, but with the player.  It’s not always a comfortable truth to stomach, but, alas, if something goes wrong, ten to one odds the fault lies with us and not with our equipment.

But there are exceptions.  And it is the specter of these exceptions that can haunt students (and teachers!).  Are low notes really supposed to be so hard?  Is my teacher right, or would I have an easier time with high notes on a different instrument?  Is that rough airstream really my student’s fault?

At this point in my teaching career, I’ve taught hundreds of students playing hundreds of instruments.  And in maybe a dozen cases, I came to the conclusion that the student’s technical problem could be laid at the feet of a substandard instrument.

In other words, it’s probably you.  But every so often, it’s not.

So how can you tell? 

One method is clearly both easiest and best: Consult an expert.  A professional recorder player can try your instrument and, within a very short period of time, tell you if it’s any good.  Case closed.  I've performed this service for many private students and I am always happy to assess someone's instrument at a workshop.  It takes almost no time to render an opinion and provides instant clarity.

But what if you don’t have a teacher?  Or what if, as in the case of so many of my students these days, you’re learning online?

Here are four things you can try:

1)    Change recorders.  A good plastic instrument is durable and highly standardized. It’s most likely going to respond in a stable and predictable way.  So try whatever you were struggling with on a good plastic instrument.  If you still struggle- it’s you.  If you can suddenly play with ease and accuracy- it may have been your instrument.

2)    Change players.  Say you have trouble with the high f, and you’re wondering if it’s you or the instrument.  Many people with no access to teachers still have access to other recorder players.  So hand your instrument to a colleague or three.  If every single one of them gets the same results you do, you may have a case for indicting your instrument.

3)    Assess the condition of your instrument.  Is your instrument over 40 years old?  Is it a school model (some hints include a rounded shape, no foot joint, straight windway, maple or pearwood).  Was it stored in a basement or attic or car for any length of time?  Did you buy it at a garage sale or very cheaply on ebay? Can you feel sticky deposits on the inside, or do you see mold or visible cracks? Has your dog ever chewed on your instrument?  If one or more of your answers to these questions is yes, there’s a greater chance your instrument isn’t up to par, and a trained recorder maker will be able to tell you if the instrument is reparable and/or worth repairing.

4)    Keep practicing.  Say you’re struggling with low notes.  Keep practicing low notes.  If, over time and with deliberate practice, your low notes improve- well, you guessed it, it was you.  But not anymore!

What Does Success Look Like?

The first time my student R attended a workshop, she spent most of the day in tears. 

I was distressed, but not surprised.  At that point in her playing life, R had a strong negative reaction to every playing mistake she made, allowing each error to derail her progress through a piece.  Whenever she made a mistake, she became so flustered that it was almost impossible for her to hop back in.

Just a few years later, R was attending workshops throughout the region, making mistakes and finding her part again with aplomb. 

Mostly, this is a credit to R’s perseverance. Not everyone would stick with playing after an upsetting experience, but R was impressively determined.

But helping R also required me to use one of the most powerful tools any teacher’s arsenal- the power to define success.

What does defining success mean? When you define success, you identify, shape, and shift the parameters by which students measure their own performance. You help students choose -and use- the success metric that best suits their abilities and needs at any given time.

If you don’t define success, your student will do it for you.  The fact is that students come to lessons with all kinds of pre-determined success metrics.  Some are explicit- students know what they want to achieve.  But some are implicit- hidden definitions that can cause trouble along the way.  In addition, students’ success metrics can also be static- they don’t change over time as a student grows.

In contrast, a good teaching success metric is explicit and dynamic- both student and teacher know what success means at any particular time, and the definition of success shifts to match student needs.  One lesson, success might mean playing all the notes in time.  A year later, success might mean playing all the notes in time and in tune.

When she attended that first workshop, R carried with her an implicit and unhelpful success metric: Success, to R, meant not making mistakes.

What I needed to do was to give R a more constructive definition of success.  After that first workshop, we debriefed and made a plan.  From now on, 10 minutes of every lesson would be devoted to sight reading duets.  And R’s only goal during these sessions was to get back in.  No matter what.  No mater how long it took. 

She could exclaim, she could sigh, she could spend most of the piece trying to figure out where she was, but if she got back in by the final cutoff, even partway through the last note, R would have succeeded.  Later, we took the same definition of success into group playing sessions.

It worked.

Slowly, but steadily, it worked.

I moved out of state and no longer teach R, but I saw her recently at a workshop and asked permission to tell her story.  The workshop featured a student performance and I watched as, during the last movement of her piece, R lost her place- and quickly hopped back in.  It was a splendid moment-  over in a few blinks of an eye. 

To Repeat or Not to Repeat?

“Do I have to play the repeats?”

It’s a question I’m often asked by new students.  Sometimes students don't even ask, but axe their repeats as a matter of course. 

And I understand the impulse. Musicians, amateur and professional, tend to be type A, efficiency-minded, get-it-done individuals (I’m no exception).  And (on the surface at least) repeating seems to be the epitome of inefficiency.  After all, you’ve already played that music!  Why would your teacher or your audience want to hear it again?

But here's the thing: Repeats aren’t superfluous drudgery.  They are vital and exciting opportunities for both you and your teacher.  You should most definitely play the repeats, and my veteran students know this.

Here’s why:

1) The composer expected it.  When your composer was penning whatever repeat-containing masterwork you’re tackling, he or she spelled out his or he intentions  in black and white.  The piece was written with repetition in mind, and if you don’t repeat, you’re leaving out 50% of the piece.  Would you ever leave out every other note, or cull 50% of the staff?  No, you wouldn’t!  (This isn't even the most compelling reason to repeat, to my mind, but it's worth saying.)

2) Surprise and delight your listener! It may not be immediately obvious, but a repeat offers you, the interpreter, an unparalleled opportunity to give your listener pleasure. If you’re repeating, you’ve already set up a set of expectations for your listener.  Playing with and overturning expectations- in this case through timing, articulation, ornamentation, etc.- is part of what makes art engaging.

3) Repeats are great data.  For both you and your teacher, repeats offer a wealth of information.  When I listen to a student repeating, I can tell if a note mistake the student made the first time around is a dug-in mistake or a transient one.  I can tell if a student really intended that particular rhythm.  I can tell if the flashy fingerwork that came off so well in iteration number one has been practiced enough to achieve consistency. And if my student has her antennae up, she’ll  be able to tell many of these things, too.

Should you play the repeats?  In my book, the answer is a resounding yes.  Happy repetition!

Three Terrific Recorder Resolutions

It’s January, the time of year in which we stop eating delicious things and start embarking on courses of self-improvement. 

Last year I cut out sugar for a month and it was dreadful.

Fortunately, at least in the musical realm, self-improvement doesn’t have to be joyless.  In fact, resolving to improve your recorder playing can be an exciting and empowering- if you consider your resolutions carefully.

Here are three fantastic January resolutions for recorder players.  I invite you to select one and stick with it for 30 days.  (Why 30 days and not the entirety of 2018? A year is a reeeallly long time.  A month is manageable.)

Completing any of these 30-day challenges will deepen your musicianship and improve your playing.  And all three of them are easier than giving up chocolate!

Recorder Resolution #1: Practice 15 minutes every day.  15 minutes!  That's it!  You can, of course, practice for more than 15 minutes- but you don’t have to.   What you can't do is collapse your 15 minutes- so no 30 minutes one day and 0 the next.  This is because small amounts of practice, distributed over time, can be incredibly powerful, especially when you practice with full attention and engagement.  And 15 minutes is a manageable amount of time, even on your busiest days!

Recorder Resolution #2: Learn one new piece per week.  When students first come to me, they often tend toward one of two extremes.  Either they’re repeaters, playing the same pieces over and over again, or racers, devouring new pieces but never working in depth.  This month, try a middle way.  Pick one new piece (of an appropriate level) to learn each week- but really work in depth on each of your selections.  By the end of the month, you should have made a good start on four new pieces.

Recorder Resolution #3: Sight reading boot camp.  Do you have a sight reading weakenss? Is it counting in whole notes?  Reading alto up the octave?  Playing in bass clef?  Maybe you’ve been wanting to tackle c clefs?  Pick your sight reading poison, then stockpile some appropriate music. Every practice session this month, devote 10 minutes to sight reading in your target area.  I promise you'll improve.

Want some free accountability?  Email me to say which of my resolutions you're embracing this month and I’ll check in with you in early February!

The Best Gift You Can Give Your Musical Self

‘Tis the season of gift-giving! .

And what if I told you there was one gift you could give your recorder playing self that’s completely free, doesn’t require a schlep to Target, and is 100% guaranteed to make you a better player?

Sounds great, right?  It is great.

It’s called distributed practice. 

I know distributed practice may not be the first thing that comes to mind when you imagine recorder-related gifts (I for one would like a full Renaissance consort, a nice Kung bass, maybe a quality sopranino….right after I win the lottery).

But it is hands down the best thing you can do for your playing this holiday season.

What is distributed practice?  Simply put, distributed practice is practice that’s spread out over time.  Distributed practice means more frequent, shorter sessions as opposed to less frequent, longer sessions. If distributed practice were a sandwich fixing, it would be peanut butter- a nice, even spread over your bread.

If you’re working on a new skill (like using your thumb correctly, or mastering a particularly difficult passage), research from the field of motor learning strongly suggests you will learn better, and faster, if you distribute your practice over time.

Instead of two marathon practice sessions a week, try five short ones.

Instead of one hour-long session a day, try two half-hour sessions. 

Instead of packing all your technical exercises at the beginning of your practice, try them once at the beginning, once in the middle, and once at the end.

Trying to master a finger twister?  Practice it, then leave it, then practice it, then leave it, then practice it- etc. etc.

For me, distributed practice has been transformative.  I believe it can be for you, as well.

You’re welcome.

Thank You

Photo by Alejandro Escamilla

November is traditionally a time of thanksgiving.   I’m a fan of gratitude: acknowledging the things you're grateful for can help you nurture a deeper appreciation for them.  But one thing I don’t often give thanks for is music.

Partly that’s because of the dailiness of music in my life.  Like laundry, cleaning, and obeisance to the almighty dishwasher, practicing is a task that is never, ever done.  And because I’m a professional musician and music teacher, music is work, with work’s attendant obligations, anxieties, and financial pressures.

But the truth is I’m deeply grateful for music.  For its truth, of course, but also, on a more fine-grained level, for its consequences- all the smaller, but no less valuable, ways in which it has ricocheted through my life.  Here are three:

I am thankful for music’s mundanity.  I practice every day.  The Sisyphean nature of music-making can wear me down.  But it can also be profoundly sustaining. I’ve had some difficult moments this year (as in other years) and being able to head into the practice room and knuckle down to the business of pushing the boulder up the hill has been a comforting constant.

I am thankful for my colleagues.  Making music with other people, even in a professional context, is personal.  At some level, when we play, we play ourselves: not who we want to be or who we pretend to be, but who we truly are on an elemental level.  And then we figure out a way to work together.  I’m thankful for every colleague who has let me hear their heart.

I’m thankful for my students.  Music has allowed me to discover what I’m truly passionate about, and that’s teaching.  To learn is an amazing, challenging, and sometimes painful endeavor- and my students inspire me every day with their joy and with their grit.

 What gifts has music given you? 

Practice Pitfalls: Are You Self-Sabotaging?

Photo by Joey Banks on Unsplash

You practice and you practice and you practice.  But when it comes time to play with others, things fall apart.

Sound familiar?

There are dozens of factors that contribute to how you perform when the chips are down- too many to enumerate a single blog entry.  But it’s worth doing a quick audit of your practice routine to see if you’re falling victim to any of these four common practice traps.  Because if you are, there's an easy fix!

Do-it-over-itis

What do you do when you’re practicing and you make a mistake? If you reflexively go back and replay a passage every time you make a mistake, you may suffer from do-it-over-itis.  Do-it-over-itis is particularly dangerous for ensemble players: By the time you’ve gone back and fixed your mistake, your ensemble mates have moved on.  (And even if you didn’t actually go back, you probably had to spend mental energy suppressing the urge to do so!)

When you practice running a piece, make a note of problem spots for later and then, after your run, spend focused time working out the kinks.

Practicing quickly

Yes, we all want to be able to play quickly.  But it’s a counterintuitive truth that we only develop the ability to play quickly by practicing slowly.  Practicing beyond the capacity of what you can do means practicing mistakes -and since we get better at doing whatever we practice, practicing mistakes isn’t the way to go. You know this.  We all know this.  But it’s 100% worth reminding ourselves. 

Slow down when you practice.

Skipping rests

I was guilty of this one for far, far too long.  Guess what you’ll be tempted to do in performance?  Furthermore, you’ll be missing an opportunity to develop the necessary and valuable skill of maintaining a beat internally when you’re not playing.

Enjoy –and practice- the silences.

Fingers only

If there’s one thing that drives me nuts, it’s hearing students warm up or practice while “marking” their breath- i.e., deliberately underblowing. Airflow is the beating, glorious heart of recorder playing, and practicing without it doesn’t accomplish much of anything.

Always practice with fully engaged air.

It Was Better at Home!

I like to joke that I should have a jar in my teaching studio labeled “It was better at home.”

In my fantasy, every time a student utters this phrase, he or she will be required deposit a dollar into the jar, thus propelling me to vast and renewable wealth.

My students find this scenario less hilarious than I do.

And I understand.  It can be incredibly frustrating to work and work and work at perfecting a piece or technique, only to have it fall apart in front of the teacher. What’s worse, the students know they CAN do it- so it’s unbelievably maddening when they don’t.

And of course I’ve experienced, and continue to experience, this frustration myself.  It is vanishingly rare that I perform to 100% of my capacity in concert.  It is always, always better at home.

So what do we do about it?

After I crack my joke, I get down to business:

Accept

Accept that it will almost always go better at home (though of course it is possible to improve your ability to perform under pressure- another topic).  Accept you are unlikely to perform at 100% of your capability, and are more likely to accomplish, say, 80% of what you set out to accomplish.  Don’t waste your energy on frustration.

Grow your 80%

Instead of fretting about not achieving 100% of what you set out to accomplish, take that energy and put it toward growing what 80% looks like.  Improving your overall skill level means the 80% you hit next week will look better than 100% you hit today.  It’s like supply-side economics for recorder playing (only, you know, it actually works!). Grow the whole pie! 

Improve your recovery

It’s not about not making mistakes- because you most likely will.  It’s about how quickly you recover.  Set aside a portion of your practice time for recovery runs- runs in which you don’t stop when you make an error, but work to right yourself quickly.

Don’t waste your money filling up my jar!  You need those dollars to buy more recorders.

Dos and Don'ts

Don’t think about an elephant!

Especially not its long trunk.  And definitely don’t think about its grey ears.  No tusks either!

Is it working? 

I’ll wager a recorder or two that the answer is no, and that there’s a large pachyderm currently sitting atop your consciousness.

It’s not your fault, of course- it’s the way our brains work.  In trying to avoid thinking about something, or trying to avoid doing something, you’re automatically activating the mental representation of whatever it is you’re trying to escape.

And for those of us who are trying to break a bad playing habit, that’s a significant obstacle.

Fortunately there’s a simple solution.

Think of a gorilla.

Black fur, long arms, agile fingers….

Now the elephant is gone.

How does this translate to recorder playing?  When I’m seeking to break a student’s bad habit, I’m most effective when I frame the task positively.  Rather than asking the student not to do something, I ask the student to do something else. 

Action as opposed to avoidance, doing as opposed to not doing.  This can be a magical reframe.  Instead of working to avoid an undesirable behavior (a difficult and often dispiriting task), the student is instead working toward adopting a desirable behavior (a challenging but inspiring task).  A do, not a don't.

Instead of asking a student to stop making breath accents, I ask for a beautiful and consistent airstream.

Instead of telling a student to stop rushing, I invite them to pay attention to every subdivision of the beat.

In my own playing, one of my struggles is not to break character so quickly at the ends of pieces and movements. 

Recently, I realized I needed a reframe, and now, instead of working on not flinging down the instrument too soon, I’m working toward enjoying that particular stillness after the final note.

Learning While Teaching

It was summer workshop party time. The concerts had been played.  The classes had been taught.  Wine was flowing.  Students and teachers sipped, mingled, and laughed.

And me?

I was holed up in a corner with a colleague talking about how to teach note releases.

Which was basically, to my mind, a giant party all on its own.

Teaching recorder is a wonderful vocation.  But it can be isolating.  There aren’t very many people in my neck of the woods who do what I do, and when I’m hired as a traveling clinician, I am most often hired to teach alone.

Summer workshops are the exception- there’s usually a full slate of fellow faculty- but summer workshops are intensive for both students and teachers, and there is seldom any slack time for teachers to exchange ideas, watch one another’s teaching, or just generally compare notes.

Hence closing down a party talking tonguing.

As I progress through my career, I am keenly aware of how much there is to learn from my colleagues (and my students, but that’s another blog post).  I’m also aware that, unlike other, more established fields, freelance early music teaching lacks organized avenues for continuing education, peer-to-peer learning, and general renewal of skills.

The model I’m most envious of, the Professional Learning Community (PLC), comes from the field of Education. PLCs are communities of professionals committed to “continuous inquiry and improvement."

I love the pairing of these words- inquiry and improvement.  Committing to inquiry and improvement means you’re no longer viewing your teaching as a static dispensation of knowledge, but rather as a dynamic learning process. And if you are actively learning, chances are your students are, too.

And so even through I lack access to organized PLCs, I strive to bring elements of inquiry and improvement into my practice whenever possible.  Here are some of the avenues I use.

Watch

I may be exhausted.  I may desperately need to prepare my own courses.  But I try never to turn down an opportunity to watch a colleague teach.  Many summer workshops have big group playing sessions or masterclasses led by a rotation of faculty.  I invariably learn something, and often many things, by watching or participating in these sessions.

Read

If a colleague has written something about teaching or learning, you’d better believe I’m reading it.  Why wouldn’t I?  Free knowledge!

Facebook

Yes, Facebook.  I’m a member of a music teachers’ Facebook group.  It’s not as active as I would like, but when I’ve reached out for support (tips on teaching teens, how to write a studio policy), I’ve gotten valuable feedback.

Chat

Formally and informally, I watch for opportunities to talk turkey about teaching.  I’m also interested in hearing about students’ learning experiences, both positive and negative.  I’m consistently amazed at how much I learn just by keeping an open ear.

If you’re a teacher, what do you do to facilitate inquiry and improvement?  How do you keep learning?

Are You Stuck In a Rut?

You know what a rut feels like.  You ‘re practicing diligently, playing the same piece or the same passage over and over again.  You don’t think you’re getting any better.  In fact, you’re getting worse. 

What do you do?

Throwing your recorder out the window or burning your music might be tempting, but it’s expensive.  And when it comes to making you a better musician, it’s not your best option. 

Instead, try this action plan for breaking free:

Don’t panic.  Falling into a rut doesn’t necessarily mean you are on the wrong track.  Ruts and potholes are part and parcel of the road to better playing, and there’s not a musician in the world who doesn’t hit them. A rut is not a reflection of your musicianship or strength of character.

Is it a knot?  To me, the practicing process is like brushing hair.  You can brush and brush the surface of your hair and think everything is smooth; but you haven’t yet discovered the knots underneath the surface.  Snarls that crop up in your practicing likely aren’t new; they’re just knots you’ve finally discovered.  Keep untangling with patience and calm.

Change things up.  If you feel like you’re banging your head against the wall during your practice, it’s time to switch things up.  Fortunately the variety of things you can change about your practice is infinite. Slow your tempo to adagio.  Change the rhythm of that tricky passage.  Change your start and stop points.  Play backwards.  Reposition yourself in the room.  Or find something new to focus on: Fingers if you’ve been focused on air, articulation if you’ve been focused on fingers. 

Step away.  Often, a practicing rut is best broken by making an appointment to come back later.  When you reach frustration level, take a short break and play something else, returning when your body and mind are relaxed.

Rest- intentionally.  Though it seems counterintuitive, sometimes the best thing you can do for yourself is to rest.  This doesn’t mean giving up or walking away or abdicating.  When done correctly, rest is an intentional act. It requires your attention and intention, and when it’s done well, it enables you to return to your instrument itching to play.

The Single Word That Can Transform Your Playing

What are you bad at?

I’m not that great sight reading.

And actually that’s a point of pride, because I used to be terrible at sight reading, and to be “not that great” marks a giant leap forward.  For the first several years of lessons, I essentially had to memorize a piece to be able to play it. 

Over the ensuing decades I’ve worked hard, and deliberately, to get better at reading, and I’ve radically improved. But I’ll never be the strongest reader in a room, and if someone in a group of professionals is going to make a reading mistake, it will probably be me.  The rapid parsing of visual information just doesn't come easily to me.

And it is undeniably true that some things come more easily to some people.  This can be frustrating.  When you see others breeze through tasks that are difficult for you, it can ding your confidence and make you feel discouraged. 

And there are so many aspects of the recorder to find challenging! I have students who have difficulty covering the holes, students who have a hard time with rhythm, students who have trouble improvising, students who have trouble performing- the list goes on.

The thing is- “bad” is not a binary.  It’s not even really the correct term.  You are not bad at something; you are at a specific starting place on your journey to better playing.  And I firmly believe that, no matter where we begin, each and every one of us can make progress in the areas that are difficult for us. 

You are not bad.   You are beginning.

It’s a simple reframe, but it opens a clear way forward.  If you are bad at something, you are content to rest on your limitations.  If you are beginning, you are motivated to research, design, and execute a plan to make progress.

A teacher can help you do this.  In fact, the transmutation of “bad” to “beginning” is one of our primary responsibilities.  But you can also make this leap on your own.   Start right now by taking a moment to answer to the question I posed at the top- what are you bad at?  Write that down.

Now cross out the word “bad.”  Write, instead, “beginning.”

Now you’re ready to take the first step on your journey forward.  Your next task is to figure out, and write down, what you can do to improve. 

The possibilities are as varied as the challenges.  If you’re a beginning sight reader, you can commit to 10 minutes a day of sight reading -perhaps in cut time.  If you’re looking to cover the holes, you could spend 5 minutes each day sitting with the recorder and feeling the appropriate finger reach.  If you are beginning to read up the octave, you can commit to trying it at your next recorder meeting.

What’s important is that your plan be:

Concrete: A concrete plan tells you what, how, where, and when to take action.

Targeted: The more specific the action you take, the faster you’ll see improvement

Feasible: Will the action plan fit into your lifestyle and time availability? If not, it won’t do you much good.

Begin today.

Why not? You can only get better from here.

How to Get the Most from Your Workshop

The Mountain Collegium Faculty realizes it has a sandal problem.

I like workshops.  They’re full of people who are learning and challenging themselves, and there’s usually lots of coffee.  A workshop is a great way to explore new music and discover new ways of thinking about music and playing.

But it’s not a magic pill.

I still remember attending my first few masterclasses.  I waited to hear the teacher say the magic words that would take my playing to the next level.

They didn’t come.  Because words don’t transform you, at least not immediately. To words, you have to add work- intentional, intelligent work over time.

Workshops can give you tools that help you accomplish that work.  They can provide guidance and motivation.  But even more valuable, a workshop widens your sense of the possible.  A workshop can show you what a more skilled version of yourself could do, and that’s incredibly motivating.

Workshops do cost money, so if you’re attending one, it makes sense to approach it in a way that will get you the most musical bang for your buck.  Over the years, I’ve attended many, many workshops, both as a student and as a teacher. Here are my hard-earned lessons about how to make a workshop work for you:

Be uncomfortable.  If you are fully comfortable with every aspect of what happens musically at a workshop, you are not learning.  You may be enjoying yourself (and if that’s all you want, fine), but if you ‘re not uncomfortable, chances are you’re not exploring new territory or expanding your understanding.  The best thing you can do for yourself at a workshop is get comfortable with being uncomfortable. If you’re not sure you’re doing it right, you’re doing it right.

Have a goal.  You probably wouldn’t go to the grocery store without a list.  Similarly, you’ll get the most out of your workshop if you walk in the door with a goal to help you filter and focus what you hear.  It’s most helpful to make it specific:  You’re here to learn more about articulation, or play bass recorder on at least two pieces, or improve your tone.  A concrete goal will help you to dodge the workshop’s signal hazard, which is overwork.  You will be tempted, sorely tempted, to learn crumhorn, sign madrigals, go to yoga class, shop for music, play after hours, and organize a workshop square dance.  Then, on Wednesday, you will collapse.  Unless you have a goal.

Stay open.  You’ll probably hear something from teachers or fellow students you disagree with or weren’t expecting.  Try it anyway.   Your teachers are trying to help you, and embracing, even if temporarily, someone else’s perspective can make you a more interesting and flexible player.

Write things down.  You may think you’ll remember the name of that terrific canzona you heard, or that smart thing you heard about breathing, or that exercise book you loved.  You won’t.  (I speak from experience!)

Chat.  One thing workshop attendees consistently tell me is how much they learn from other workshop attendees. I know I nearly always learn something at workshops from students and colleagues.  Even if you’re not the chatty kind, take a moment to strike up a conversation at coffee hour (bonus = coffee).

Ask for financial help.  Many workshops offer some kind of financial aid for those who couldn’t otherwise afford it.  Often, this isn’t well-publicized and I’ve several times seen scholarships go unclaimed. If aid would make the difference to you between attending and not attending a workshop, ask!

Bring coffee.  Some workshops have excellent coffee. Some workshops have coffee of the quality one drinks only in desperate circumstances.  Desperate circumstances will arise.

Go.  I urge my students to attend workshops when it’s financially feasible, because they always come back inspired.  Workshops aren’t magic beans, but they are infusions of fuel: your fire will burn more brightly.

And if you’d like to join me at a workshop this summer, I’m privileged to be teaching at four: Check out the Virginia Baroque Performance Academy, Mountain Collegium, Mideast,  and SFEMS Recorder Week.

Use What You Have

Photo credit: Marin Currie

Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can

   -Arthur Ashe

I have this quote taped to the door of my studio.  That’s out of character, because inspirational quotes (Dream big!  Reach for the stars!) make me itchy.  Often they represent endpoints, telling you where to go without telling you how to get there.  And an endpoint with no plan is the opposite of good teaching- and good learning.

But Ashe’s quote is different.  In three sentences, Ashe assures us that everyone can learn and everyone can grow -every single one of us, without exception- and what’s more, he tells you how to do it.

Each of the quote’s three sentences is worth mulling, but lately it’s that middle one I keep coming back to.

Use what you have

As teachers, we frequently focus on pinpointing weaknesses. We figure our job is to assess what’s going wrong and why, and determine what a student needs to do to fix it. Do you need less tension in your fingers?  More knowledge of the uses of different tonguing patterns?  Better thumb technique?

This focus on need can be valuable, but it sometimes overwhelms what could, and should, be an equally detailed assessment of strength.

A strengths-based approach to teaching and learning pays multiple dividends.

First, a focus on strengths invites students to nurture areas in which they are already strong rather than simply shoring up areas in which they are weak. Just because something is an area of strength does not mean it could not be further developed -and turned into an even greater asset.  

As a player, I’ve spent many years trying to shore up my musical weaknesses. I worked, and continue to work on my rhythmic precision, my reading, my harmonic understanding. 

And this was, and is, valuable work.  But I wish it hasn’t taken me as long as it did to focus on improving my shaping, one of my areas of relative strength.  Just because I was already strong didn’t mean I didn’t have room to grow.

Second, a focus on strengths allows us to harness what we –and our students- do well to help us learn more efficiently and effectively. Each student’s strengths are individual, as are each student’s weaknesses, and finding a way to apply strength to weakness can be magical.

Here are some examples:

Student A

Student A, a professional musician transitioning to the recorder, was struggling with overblowing.  Student A had an excellent ear and the ability to adjust his blowing to match pitch.  We developed a practice plan involving matching pitch with a tuner to help A accustom himself to the recorder’s optimal airflow.

Student B

Student B, a five-year-old girl learning recorder for the first time, was struggling with hand position and did not enjoy having her positioning corrected. B was highly articulate and eager to communicate her knowledge. We spent several weeks having B “be the teacher,” instructing me and her mother in the proper way to hold a recorder, improving her own positioning in the process.

Student C

Student C was not a natural improviser, and ornamentation was initially daunting.  But C was extremely hardworking and ferociously organized.  Together, C and I developed a set of “rules” for ornamentation and outlined a step-by-step process, allowing her to use her strengths in task analysis and process implementation to work toward successfully going off-book.

What strengths do you and your students have?  How have you recently accessed your strengths, or helped someone to use what they have?

Switcheroo

At the Kelischek workshop, Brasstown, NC

Flexibility is an important life skill.  It’s also an essential part of playing the recorder.  We frequently move between fingering systems, switching from C instruments to F instruments, G and D and beyond. And we toggle between clefs- treble and bass to start, and often more.

It’s a great mental workout, but it can also be frustrating.  You pick up an alto but your fingers are still playing a tenor. Or you’re trying to read bass clef and your mind slips back into treble.

“How do I deal with switching instruments?” is a question I’m asked frequently at workshops. 

There’s no easy answer, but there is an answer: strategic practice combined with a simple technique for orienting yourself to new instruments and clefs.

Get Comfortable

It might seem obvious, but the first step is to get as comfortable as possible in each mode (clef or fingering system) in which you play.  If you’re not comfortable in bass clef, for example, spend a little time each day reading in that clef.  There’s no “trick” to clef reading, but it does get easier with practice!

Pause

Rather than picking up a new instrument and plunging right in, take a moment to breathe and go through a three-part checklist:

1)    Ground yourself physically by placing all seven fingers and your thumb on the instrument, as if you were playing its lowest note.  This will help accustom your body and mind to the new stretch.

2)    Say the name of the lowest note in your mind.

3)    See the line or space to which the lowest note corresponds.  Imagine yourself playing that note.

Taking the time to orient yourself, both physically and mentally, will pay dividends when you start to play.

Switch it up

We get better at what we practice, so why not explicitly practice switching? One exercise I often give students is to take a multi-part piece and, working either up or down, play each of the parts in turn.  It’s a great way to practice, deliberately, the flexibility you’ll want during workshops and performances.

Happy switching!

The Joy of Getting Better

Among the many -many!!- reasons to play the recorder is the visceral delight of improvement.  As we get older and dig ourselves into our daily ruts, there are fewer and fewer opportunities for us to set our minds to something, work hard at it, and make progress.  After all, how much better can you really get at merging into traffic, reading the newspaper, or cleaning the stove?

Improving on the recorder offers a sense of mastery and personal satisfaction and pays real musical dividends, enabling you to increase your enjoyment of playing both by yourself and with others.

Yet, over the years I've watched multiple students struggle with the sense that they are treading water when, in fact,  they're improving by leaps and bounds.  A sense of progress can be elusive when you're working hard every day.

Fortunately, there's a clear solution.  Together, my student and I pay attention to how- and when, and why- we're measuring progress.

*Where are you going?  When students come to me with the general goal of improving their playing, I work with them to drill down to some specific goals.   It's tough to see whether or not you're moving forward if you're not sure where you're going.  Perhaps you want to learn the bass recorder, or improve your airflow, or play better in tune.  Whatever your goals are, write them down:  The act of putting them in writing -and referring back to them- helps focus your energy.

*Find your starting line When you're practicing regularly, it's easy to focus on how far you have to go and forget how far you've come.  Take the time to notice, and record, where you are when you start.   This might mean writing down how long you took to learn a piece in bass clef, or timing how long you can blow a note smoothly, or recording yourself playing a piece you're working on. 

*Celebrate your miles  Returning to pieces you've worked on before can be an electrifying way to measure progress and inspire you to keep moving forward.  Try letting a piece rest for at least nine months before picking it up again.  If you've been improving, you'll notice a difference in how you approach the piece, whether that's technically, musically, or both. 

*Find a coach- or a friend.  One of the best things a teacher can do for you is widen your perspective.  It's much more difficult to perceive progress -or lack of progress- on a day-to-day basis than it is to perceive patterns long term.  If you don't have a teacher, it's still worth recruiting another set of ears.  Try checking in at a yearly workshop, or finding a recorder accountability partner to listen to you play.

*The more you know, the more you know you don't know.  It's both a cruel and a marvelous truth that, in any area of life, the greater your expertise, the more accurately you're able to perceive the boundlessness of your ignorance.  It's a little like descending in an airplane: When you're up high, you might be able to make out general shapes like mountains and rivers.  As you get closer to your destination, the details of the landscape leap out at you- individual roads and houses and even cars.  The more you improve, the more the wonder and richness of your project becomes evident. But so does its scale!  Perhaps you've improved at hearing when your recorder is out of tune with others.  That is real progress- but in the short term, your new knowledge may disturb you as you learn to apply it constructively.

I was discussing this yesterday with a student -the immensity of all there is to learn about music.  He came up with a wonderful quote from the poem "Brown Penny" by William Butler Yeats.  The poem is about the boundlessness of love, but that sense of boundlessness, we decided, applies equally to music.   We could study for an eternity- 

Till the stars had run away
And the shadows eaten the moon.

-and still not know everything there was to know.  To me, that's part of the joy of learning (and teaching!).  The road goes ever on.

If improvement inspires you, take a few minutes to think about how you measure, and acknowledge, your progress.  It could open your eyes- and ears!

The Power of Rest

It’s Christmas today.  I must confess I practiced. 

I also practiced on Thanksgiving.  And my wedding day.  And six days after my son’s birth.  I believe in practice.  It's sustaining and grounding and potent, and even though I don’t have as much space for it in my life as I used to, I still undertake to practice daily.

But this isn’t a post about the power practice.  It's about the power of rest.

Sometimes, we are forced to rest.  Perhaps you’re traveling all day, and your fellow airplane passengers would be less than 100% enthusiastic if you whipped out your sopranino recorder.  Maybe you have the flu, or jury duty, or some other of life's immovables.  Maybe you’ve injured yourself and need time to recover. 

Sometimes, we choose rest.  A day, a week, a month.  Short or long, we choose to carve out a space in which our fingers are still and our breath returns to its usual work of keeping us alive.

Rest is not a bad thing.  But it does require intention and purpose.

How do you know you need to rest?

Does playing hurt?  If playing is painful, either physically or mentally, that’s an indicator you may need to take a break.  Note that “frustrating” is different from painful- frustration is an intermittently necessary part of practice; pain is an unhelpful dead end.

Do you need a break?  Sometimes we can reach into a cul-de-sac in our practice, in which we've become so fixated on, or caught by, some detail that we cease to make progress.  Or we're simply tired. 

How to rest?

Set your parameters.  Before you undertake a rest, you need to make sure you know what that rest will look like and when it will end.  A rest with no fixed endpoint isn’t a rest; it’s a hiatus, and it likely won’t serve you in your quest to become a better musician.  Set a deadline- even if it’s a deadline for asking yourself whether or not you need to rest some more.   I personally tend to do best with a short rest- a day or two, a week at most.  You’ll discover how long you need.  Setting parameters on your rest also liberates you from guilt: You're not failing to practice; you're deliberately resting.

What kind of rest do you need? Often, you don’t need a break from music. You simply need a break from whatever kind of practicing or music-making you’ve been immuring yourself in lately.  Take a few days to try something new, like learning tunes by ear, listening to recordings, or even playing through things you like.  Meet your friends to play some consort music, go to a live concert- all of these changes can help you return to your practice revitalized and inspired.

So while I did practice today, my practice was different from my usual fare.  Instead of working on a piece I’m going to perform or honing on a specific technique, I’m simply reading, visiting with music I’ve never played and then moving on. 

It feels exploratory.  A little bit joyous.  Restful.

The Million Dollar (Recorder!) Question

What makes individual students succeed?

It’s astonishing to write, but at this point I’ve been teaching recorder for 16 years.  During that time, I’ve taught long-term students and short-term students, absolute beginners and professional musicians, five-year-olds and 85-year-olds and a whole lot in between.

Every student makes progress- but some of them grow by leaps and bounds.  And I can safely say that there is one variable that powerfully predicts whether a student is going to stick with the instrument and blossom, or let his interest wither.

First, a caveat: As a teacher, I consider your progress my responsibility.  If you’re not practicing, it’s my job to figure out what motivates you to practice and help you develop the skills you need to set and meet practice goals.  My job doesn’t end when I close the door to my teaching studio or shut down my computer after an online lesson.

Nevertheless, despite my best efforts, some students blaze forward while others sputter. And yes, some of that is due to differences in drive or investment or experience or inclination. 

But there’s one question I can ask an incoming student that can let me know, in just a few words, the likelihood of that student turning up for lessons next year:

Do you play with others?

The recorder is a sociable instrument.  Most of the time, hearing one recorder on its own is not particularly exciting.  But playing recorder in concert with other instruments, and especially with other recorders, can be magical. 

We humans are sociable, too.  We like to belong to communities, and a community centered on music is a pretty wonderful place to be.  I’ve seen amazing things in the recorder communities I’ve interacted with: people helping one another, and playing music with one another, through sickness and health, joy and sorrow.

Do you play with others?

If a student says yes, it means she has a built-in laboratory in which to try out the new skills she’s learning.  It means she has built-in feedback: She and her playing partners, will be able to see –and hear- the progress she’s made.  And it means she has a built in motivator, a setting to inspire her to work toward her goals and set new ones.

If a student says no, it means I will have to work harder to help that student find meaningful ways to measure her progress, enjoy her playing, and find the motivation to practice.  Sometimes I succeed- particularly when I find ways to connect the student with other players!  Sometimes I don’t.

Do you play with others?

I do.  I hope you do, too.  Making music with others is motivation and laboratory and feedback rolled into one.  And more than that, greater than that, it's a joy.